Golden Sun was the first JRPG I ever played and therefore is the best one ever – those are the rules. This isn’t just the nostalgia goggles though, because I actually replay the first two games (Golden Sun and Golden Sun: The Lost Age) every few years with the GameCube GBA adapter. Originally planned as one huge game, it had to be split into two halves which were released in 2001 and 2002. A sequel, Dark Dawn came to DS in 2010, but best to forget about that if we’re being honest. So, what happened to this series? Why haven’t we had a new Golden Sun game in over 11 years? Did the studio shut down? Nope. Turns out Camelot is alive and well, but it's too busy developing Mario Golf games to make a new Golden Sun. Well, enough golf I say, it’s time for a Golden Sun reboot.
For any of you who either haven’t played Golden Sun or have forgotten about it, the first two games follow two groups of characters as they fight against, and then for, the forces of alchemy – an elemental magic that is the lifeblood of the world. They’re Adepts, people who can channel one of the four elements, and little critters called Djinn aid you on the journey, providing stat buffs and powerful summons in battle. The summons are incredible, bombastic displays of power that really pushed what the GBA was capable of. Collecting them was a big part of Lost Age – I remember travelling to every nook and cranny of the game’s vast overworld to find all the most powerful ones.
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In Golden Sun, you play as Isaac, a teenager racing across the world to stop Saturos and Menardi, two Fire Adepts, from igniting the elemental lighthouses and flooding the world with alchemy. They’ve kidnapped Isaac’s childhood friend, Jenna, and his mentor, Kraden too. In a shocking twist, you actually lose in the first game – the alchemic light of two lighthouses floods the world, and Jenna and Kraden are lost at sea. The second game then flips your perspective and has you play as Felix, Jenna’s brother who was working with the fiendish fiery duo. You find out that alchemy is actually essential, and the world is crumbling without it, so it turns out the bad guys were the good guys all along, they were just being massive dicks about everything. This perspective switch absolutely blew my mind as a child and I thought it was the height of storytelling. Eat your heart out, Ellie and Abby.
If you had a link cable and two Game Boys, or you were willing to copy out a very, very long code, you could import your characters from Golden Sun into The Lost Age. This was necessary for reaching 100 percent completion, as you needed to collect all Djinn across both games in order to unlock a secret boss in Lost Age. It’s a great mechanic that makes each playthrough feel unique. They give you a spectacle to work towards in each fight, and I want to see them again in a remake or sequel – only bigger and better than ever.
The visual splendor of these encounters helped to eliminate any trace of tedious grinding often found in RPGs. There are spells that summon volcanic eruptions, lightning storms, and even a huge sword that drops out of the sky to impale foes. Certain weapons could let out howls, which are special attacks that could be as absurd as causing a meteor to crash down on your enemies. I’ve already mentioned the summons, but they truly were something else. My favourite is Daedelus, which calls a hulking colossus that fires a barrage of missiles at your foes. The combat looks phenomenal, even on a GBA, I can only imagine how impressive it would be on the more powerful Nintendo Switch.
You might be thinking “Issy mate, why do you want to see the Golden Sun series revisited if you can just play the games any time you want?” Well first, get off my back, and second the games felt very ahead of their time – a modern remake on the Switch would be absolutely transcendent. Seeing the summons come to life in HD is something kid me could only dream of. The overworld was vast, but lacking in finer detail, something a remake could fix. The world is crumbling in a very literal sense – it’s a flat, disc shape, and The Lost Age allows you to take a ship and travel right to its edge. It’s amazing seeing the water fall off of the edge of the world and into the nothingness below. Finally, a JRPG for flat Earthers
Seeing the games come alive again, for a new audience and old fans alike, would be amazing. Camelot head Hiroyuki Takahashi is even open to the idea of making a fourth game, stating in an interview, “Perhaps if there are enough Nintendo users asking for another game in the Golden Sun series, then this will naturally lead to the development of such a game.” Well, I’m asking Takahashi. Go on. For me.
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